This invention relates to valves for controlling the flow of fluid and more particularly to a locking device for use in association with such valves and with a ball valve in particular.
Locking devices are well known in the field of fluid valves and are employed as safety devices for preventing unauthorized or inadvertent operation of the valve. Many of these locking devices employ a padlock which includes a shackle which is passed through a portion of the valve or a device fixed to the valve for preventing movement of the valve operator. Typically, an inexpensive sheet metal device is fabricated and joined to the valve, and located so as to be adjacent the path of travel of the valve operator or to cooperate with the valve operator, so that when a padlock is attached thereto, some movement of the valve operator is prevented. In the ball type of valve, typically the valve operator is a handle consisting of a lever which is swung through an arc of about ninety degrees, between a valve open position parallel to the axis of the valve and a valve closed position transverse thereto. Various devices have been employed in the past to lock the handle in one or both of its extreme positions, but these devices are cumbersome, unwieldy, expensive, insufficiently secure, or difficult to manufacture, assembly or utilize and thus have not provided a completely satisfactory solution.